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Hello, and welcome to my most recent lockdown project. 🙂
Looks like this is gonna kinda be a ‘Blog-in-Reverse’. 😉 Now that I’ve finished my Chaparrals, it’s time to document the struggle!
Without further adieu, let’s wade in!
I have needed air defense for my modern U.S., Israeli, and other forces I wish to simulate on the table. At the time of acquisition, this was the only miniature I could find of an M-48 Chaparral, surface-to-air missile launcher, to compliment my metal miniatures of M-163 Vulcans, by MiniFigs.
Thus, this was my starting point:
https://www.shapeways.com/product/9PS2QW4SL/m-730a1-chaparral?optionId=78922943
As the miniature did NOT come with missiles, I searched all over for affordable aim-9 sidewinders, in 144 scale. If I didn’t want to buy four aircraft kits, my only option at the time was Shapeways, again. This time, the only thing I could find was sidewinders sculpted for 144 scale ‘Gundam’ giant robots:
The missiles are wildly out of scale. 🙁 We made it work, though, I think. 🙂
I wish I’d taken pics of the missiles. All eight were printed as one piece, with integral launch pylons. The missiles required some ‘whittling’. 🙂 Here’s a shot of both vehicles, after adding a plank for stowage, and a little work with epoxy putty:
Further work with epoxy putty, to add further stowage, and to try out my new silicone shapers! I believe I also ate cashews… 😉
To mount the turrets, I added a plate on the underside for the turret ring to rest on. I then filled the underside with epoxy putty. Ready for priming!
Primed! Just prior to priming them, I noticed from reference photos that the stowed camo net on one vehicle should be wider. I added this, before spraying:
After priming, I block-painted in all the basic colors. As I was about to do my stylized window paint scheme, there was a RUSSIAN INVASION, and I was forced to do the windows on a few more vehicles.
With windows finished, I painted in a few pre-wash details, and next did a drybrush highlight. At this stage, they were ready for decals.
With decals done, they received a wash of Army Painter Soft Tone, all over. The tracks got Strong Tone:
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At this point, they turned out just too dark. This had been bothering me, and, although the accompanying M-163 vehicles were finished over a year ago, I still thought they were rather dark, as well. In a recent conversation with my good friend, Andrew, he gave me a tip that solved my problem, I think. Though the photos are terrible, I’m pleased with the finished models. They were all a pleasure to work on.
I’ll try to get better pics of these, perhaps on the battlefield. Thanks for reading along!
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